


The Paul Bunyan of World War Two

by AgeOfAlejandro



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-02-26
Updated: 2012-06-16
Packaged: 2017-10-31 20:21:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/348000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgeOfAlejandro/pseuds/AgeOfAlejandro
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>for this <a href="http://capkink.livejournal.com/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://capkink.livejournal.com/"><b>capkink</b></a> <a href="http://capkink.livejournal.com/1973.html?thread=1597109#t1597109">prompt</a>: Everyone knows who "Captain America" is: he's the Star-Spangled Man used in all that propaganda from WWII - posters, movies, they even had some actors in costume doing fund-raising tours. Like "Rosie the Riveter" and "Uncle Sam." But there was never actually a <i>real</i> Cap. Right?</p><p>Then just who was it the Avengers pulled out of the North Atlantic?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Tony arched an eyebrow and leaned his chair back idly. "Captain America was a guy in a ridiculous _costume_. Some schmuck they picked up off the streets in Brooklyn. He's not even like Rosie the fucking Riveter, who had some actual social value. He's the Paul Bunyan of World War Two, designed to sell war bonds and look pretty. Whoever you have isn't Captain American."

Fury crossed his arms over his chest. "That's what you're _supposed_ to believe, Stark. Do you really think government would've wanted everyone to know he's real? When he's essentially a one-of-a-kind super weapon? I don't think so."

Tony rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Show me your man in the meat locker, since that's what you brought me here for."

"It's not a _meat locker_ ," Fury replied irritably, getting up from behind his desk. "It's a defrost chamber."

"You pulled the guy out of the North Atlantic, right?" Tony asked, climbing to his feet to follow.

"Yeah," Fury agreed, opening the office door and exiting into the hallway.

"And he was frozen when you fished him out?"

"Yes." Fury opened a door with his ID card, eying Tony with ever more irritation.

"Then I should call it a morgue instead," Tony said.

Fury turned to look at Tony and rolled his eyes. "He's not dead."

"Humans aren't built to survive being turned into a popsicle. Unless your man was a mutant?" Tony asked curiously. "I bet one of them might actually be able to survive being frozen."

"No, he isn't," Fury said as they approached a giant metal door. "He was, before he joined the experiment, a baseline human like you and me."

"Uh huh," Tony replied skeptically. "Then I'm going to keep calling it a morgue."

Sighing, Fury rolled his eyes again and put his hand on a scanner pad meant for fingerprinting beside the door.

Tony ignored it as it slid open, opting instead to study the pad as Fury walked in. "This is ridiculous. I could hack this with a _gummi bear_. If this is what's standing between me and a top secret morgue, it's no wonder you guys bungle everything. Jesus."

"I," Fury replied as he stuck his head back out the door, "have never bungled _anything_. Get your ass in here."

"Fine, fine," Tony grumbled and rolled his eyes. "I'm not kidding about the gummi bear thing," he said as he trailed after Fury into the cold room, examining the medical equipment that, yes, did indeed say the man was alive. "All I have to do is get you to hold one for a minute, and--"

"We can talk about that later, Stark," said Fury as he swept away the ice from the top of what looked a bit like an incubator.

"Oh my god, it's like _Snow White_!" Tony said as he peered into the space within. "Ohhh, hey, he's really hot. D'you want me to kiss him or something? I could pretend to be his prince charming for a little while, and--"

"I find it a little unsettling that you're this eager to kiss what you were pretty sure was a corpse until five seconds ago," Fury said dryly.

"He's alive, I believe you," Tony said defensively. "I'm pretty sure he is, anyway. All the displays over there," he gestured wildly, "would be flatlined if he weren't, right?"

"Right," said Fury. "And no, you can't kiss him. In fact, if I ever find you kissing him, I will personally string you up."

Tony rolled his eyes. "Fine, whatever. I'll keep my hands off your precious Captain America lookalike."

"This _is_ Captain America," Fury repeated.

"If you say so," Tony said, studying the man in the incubator. "So what exactly is it you want from me?"

And Fury told him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took so long. I had written what I _figured_ would happen when they met (in terms of their reaction to each other rather than specific events), but wanted to see if I was right before I posted.  
>  I was. :)
> 
> Also, a taad bit of era-appropriate-for-Steve sex negativity.

Steve hated the twenty first century. It was alien and upsetting and he wanted to go home, more than he ever had before. Home was Bucky and hot summer days and fellas in suspenders and dames in silk stockings and where everything was slower. At least during the war, home was always just on the other side of the sea. Now it was seventy years away and time was a much deeper divide than space.  
  
Fury had done what he could to mitigate it. Offered him history and culture lessons (it was jarring, to say the least, that the years he still thought of as the future were everyone else's past, assuming they had been alive for it at all) and tried to ease him into the new world. It wasn't working well and Steve was beginning to suspect that maybe it was like swimming; you got used to it after diving in. It was shocking and cold and weird at first, but before long you didn't notice it.  
  
And then he found out everyone thought he wasn't real. That had been a punch to the gut. His civilian identity had been erased and there was only Captain America, a fictional light in the dark, mentioned on the same page as Uncle Sam and Rosie the Riveter in the history books. It made him so tired and angry and sad.  
Steve didn't want medals or statues in recognition of his service, but he didn't think it was too much to ask to be remembered as a real person.  
  
  
  
"So I'm supposed to meet my team today?" Steve asked Fury, crossing his arms and eying the pile of folders the other man had under his elbow.  
  
"Yep," Fury agreed, staring at the door like an irritated cat.  
  
"Are you going to tell me anything about them? Or give me those files?" Steve said, idly tapping a finger against his arm.  
  
"No," Fury said. "You'll meet them soon enough."  
  
Steve was becoming cross but chose to save his breath. He'd known Fury long enough to know that there wasn't any point in pushing when he was like this. Later he'd half suspect Fury sat on the files so he wouldn't try to flee.  
  
  
  
After the meeting, Steve concluded Stark was utterly _insufferable_. He was smug, self-satisfied, _rude_ , and arrogant, and Steve didn't want him anywhere near his team. It was going to be hard enough to create team cohesion as it was (a neurotic scientist, an ex-circus worker, an ex-Soviet assassin, an exiled _god_ , what the hell, and of course Steve himself) and he didn't need a punk like Stark making things for difficult.  
  
"Oh, I know what Stark's like," Fury said as they strode short distance between the meeting room and the man's office, the files finally tucked under Steve's arm. "He's a grade-A asshole. But he's useful, both as Iron Man and as an engineer. In a couple hours, he invented one of the most important machines we needed to wake you up."  
  
Steve wasn't sure that he should thank Stark for that. "He doesn't even want to _be_ on the team."  
  
"No," Fury disagreed. "He does. I don't pretend to know everything that goes on in that squirrelly head of his, but I do know he wants to be on the team. He's just an emotional fuck up who can't show that he wants something that isn't selfish."  
  
"Why is he like that?"  
  
"A fuck up? That's all in his file, Rogers. I suggest you get to reading instead of following me," Fury said as he opened his office door and stepped inside. "Ask Romanoff if you have more questions. She wrote up most of them."  
  
With that, Fury shut the door behind him, leaving Steve standing in the hallway alone.  
  
  
  
All the files were, but Stark's especially was interesting reading. He had been hailed as the heir to the Stark legacy and treated like a showpony from the time he was a little kid. He was promiscuous, with scads of photos and sex tapes(!) on the internet and he was a recovering alcoholic with a history of suggested drug use (nothing concrete - his two visits to rehab were for alcoholism - but still enough suggestion to be worth mentioning). Stark was impulsive, reckless, selfish in his personal life, and frequently uncooperative. But there was also an extensive list of charities and organizations he worked with and donated to, the changes evidently wrought by his three-month stint in an Afghanistani cave, and his work as Iron Man.  
He was insufferable, but maybe worth the effort of bringing him onto the team.  
  
  
  
"I'd like a word with you please, Stark," Steve followed Stark out of the training room and pulled off the cowl. Their first practice together had been a total disaster and they _really_ needed to work on cohesion.  
  
"No, I don't think so," Stark said before pulling off his helmet. "I think I've had all the Captain America I can stand for today, thanks."  
  
Steve restrained a sigh and sat on the bench against the wall, resting his shied against his leg. "I know we got off on the wrong foot. I wasn't very nice to you either, to be honest, and I'm sorry. I want to try again."  
  
"That's unfortunate," Stark said, not looking at Steve as he peeled off a gauntlet.  
  
God, for all that he looked like Howard, Stark was _nothing_ like him. Steve narrowed his eyes and, despite knowing it was cruel, he went for what he knew would hurt. "Your father would have at least been willing to give it a chance."  
  
Stark's expression flickered through a series of expressions too fast for Steve to read but then he smiled, something hard in his eyes. "Ah yes, the inevitable comparison to dear old Dad. That's always fun. Howard Stark: industrial saint. Tony Stark: biggest sinner since Eve." Stark's eyes hardened further and he smiled again. "I hate to break it to you, but that halo of his was radioactive. Maybe you should think about that," he said. As Stark turned away, he added, "And you know what? I think I liked you better when I thought you were a story."  
  
Steve clenched his jaw as Stark walked away.  
  
  
  
Fury pulled up a chair and straddled it as Steve glared at his dinner. "So I hear you tried to talk to Stark."  
  
"He's _impossible_ ," Steve ground out.  
  
"What did you say to him?" Fury asked, ignoring Steve's comment. "Because I think I'm going to have to send him a bill for the eight doors he destroyed on the way out."  
  
"That I wasn't very nice to him the first night and that we should try again. He refused. I said his father--"  
  
"Whoa, _whoa_ ," Fury interrupted, holding up a hand to stop him. "Never, ever mention his father to him unless you want to piss him off. Did you even _read_ his file?"  
  
Steve put down his fork. "Howard was a good man," he said defensively, ignoring the two latter things. "At least he would have tried again if we had gotten off on the wrong foot."  
  
"Maybe the Howard Stark _you_ knew," Fury said and crossed his arms on the back of the chair. "But that's not the same man Tony Stark knew, not by a long chalk. What did he say when you mentioned his father?"  
  
"'Howard Stark: industrial saint'," Steve said, complete with air quotes, "that Howard had a radioacitve halo, whatever that means, and that he liked me better before he knew I was real."  
  
"Oh yeah," Fury said, "you fucked up big time. The last part is pure Stark asshole behavior, but the other two? There's a reason people say he has daddy issues. What he meant by a 'radioactive halo' was that most people saw his father as a hero when, at home, he was the furthest thing from. He hides it well enough most of the time, but that people have almost deified Howard since he died really pisses Stark off. And radioactivity -- did Agent Fellman explain what nuclear weapons are and how they work?" When Steve shook his head, Fury said, "I'll have a link explaining it sent to you. Or a book. Whichever you prefer."  
  
"A book please," Steve said.  
  
Fury nodded. "All right." He stood up and flipped the chair around to tuck it under the table. "But seriously, don't mention Stark's father to him again or I'll bill you instead."

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks go to [**pixie_rings**](http://pixie-rings.livejournal.com/)


End file.
